Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Horse-head shaped Nebula




See Explanation.  Clicking on the picture will download  the highest resolution version available.
Horse-head shaped Nebula
Credit & CopyrightNigel Sharp (NOAO), KPNOAURANSF

Don't you think it really looks like a horse head? Well to me it does - what an amazing creation of the Nature.

Horse-head Nebula  is one of the most identifiable nebulae in the sky, the Horsehead Nebula in Orion, is part of a large, dark, molecular cloud. Also known as Barnard 33, the unusual shape was first discovered on a photographic plate in the late 1800s. The red glow originates from hydrogen gas predominantly behind the nebula, ionized by the nearby bright star Sigma Orionis


The darkness of the Horsehead is caused mostly by thick dust, although the lower part of the Horsehead's neck casts a shadow to the left. Streams of gas leaving the nebula are funneled by a strong magnetic field. Bright spots in the Horsehead Nebula's base are young stars just in the process of forming. Light takes about 1,500 years to reach us from the Horsehead Nebula. The above image was taken with the 0.9-meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory.

Shared via NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day (21 October 2012)

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